A Happy Marriage

Just read a question "are you happily married?" "is your spouse happily married?"

This made me think.
Hard.

Are we really happily married? Are my friends happily married? Are my parents happily married? Were my grandparents happily married? Most seem to have a happy marriage on the outside. But will we ever see the inside of the marriages? The marriages we emulate, are they really worth emulating?

Is it true that most marriages the couples are not happy, but stick with it for various reasons? Is it because of the kids involved? Or, for those financially secure stay put because it beats the alternative? Or the don't want the shanda of being a divorcee?

There is no reason for me to compare my marriage to others. Why would I want to be jealous of someone else, when I do not know what is really going on? If I am not happy in a situation and I think my friend is happier but her sex is not as amazing as mine, will I be willing to give up what I have in order to have a happier appearance?

Now why is someone not happy in their marriage? How many feel that if they knew then what they now know, they would not have gotten into the marriage contract in the first place? Knowledge is powerful here. Imagine if you can see ahead and decide to plan your life based on that. Would it really work? If you knew your husband was going to cheat on you, would you have married him in the first place? We tend to forget the amazing things that have happened and all the happy days we have had and focus on the negative. Would you really throw away x amount of your life or not even experience it in the first place?

How many times have you said the words "had I only known...I would not have...". How many? Do you honestly think that you made a bad decision and now you have to live with it?

Should we really set the bar for the youngsters? Should we tell everyone DON'T get married so early in life. You really do not know what you want or getting into. DON'T do it! Will we do that to our children or will we let them make their own decision and let them live their own life and learn from it. We can only teach them how to pick and choose the right one.

What is the right one? Do we take the faults of our spouse and say, this is wrong, the opposite is good and therefore I would NOT choose what is bad? Do we set the bar higher? Do we change and think about our own faults and what we do to cause our spouse to respond, or is only a one way street?

What makes us happy? What makes a happy marriage? Do you think your neighbor is happy? If you hear no yelling and they always look happy, do you really think that they have a desirable marriage? Would you tell your intimate secrets to your friend in hope of your friend to share with you the same? Do you judge based on your friends marriage? Do you decide if they have a good marriage or not and that sets the bar for you?

Stop looking at others. Find out what makes you happy and what makes you get upset. Work on it yourself. Change you. Your spouse will change as well. But stop the comparison. It really is not worth it. You have good too, just need to realize that it is work. Whoever said marriage is not work lied. We all know that.

Just do it.

Ksiva V'chasima Tova.

Bassy